life in the bush – our place amongst the gum trees

Cold Winds and Warm Cake

Spring blossom and distant hills…

After a few warm and balmy days with lazy Sunday afternoons spent sitting outside, enjoying the sun and the view with cuppa in hand, we’ve returned to some cold and dreary weather, with bitter winds pulling the temperature right down.

To add insult to injury, I picked up a virus that has left me shivering and achy, and there is no decent firewood left in our shed!

Never mind, I’ve curled up under a quilted down sleeping bag on the couch and read my way through a small collection of books and even watched a couple of episodes of my favourite television program on DVD.

Better, Will made a cake with carefully swapped around ingredients so that I could enjoy it, too.

Delicious.

And very comforting.

Which is just what I needed.

So, for something a little bit different, I thought I’d share his recipe with you:

Raspberry and Coconut Cake

Mmmm….cake…

Ingredients

100 g unsalted butter ormacadamia oil (Will used butter this time)

100 g honey (about 5 tbs, don’t get too hung up on measuring)

2 eggs lightly beaten (we use quite large ones, free range)

40 g shredded coconut (+ additional handful for top)

1 tsp vanilla extract

200 g almond flour

50 g coconut flour

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

a splash of coconut milk (about 4 tbs) – or cow’s milk, if you prefer

100g raspberries (fresh if possible – Will sourced some at great expense, but it was worth it – otherwise frozen will do)

Method

Grease a 20cm cake tin and preheat oven to 175’C.

In a large bowl, beat butter and sugar until light and creamy.

Slowly add eggs, beating gently.

Beat in shredded coconut and vanilla extract.

Sift together the almond and coconut flours with the bicarb into a separate bowl.

Fold the flour into the mix.

Add small amounts of (coconut) milk until the batter reaches a gooey stage that drops easily off a spoon.

Gently stir in the raspberries.

Smooth the batter into the cake tin.

Sprinkle the additional shredded coconut on the top. If you have a few spare raspberries you could sprinkle them around, too.